British on tightrope over captives in Iran

London asked the UN Security Council on Thursday to 'deplore' Iran's seizure of its sailors.

from the March 30, 2007 edition

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Britain believes that it can get the EU to signal strong support at a foreign ministers meeting Friday. EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana has already told the Iranians that the EU viewed the detention of the sailors as unacceptable.

"The overall game plan is to encourage the EU countries to consider what we've done, suspending business with Iranian government," says a Foreign Office official, on condition of anonymity.

Analysts are not sure if all European countries will be eager to impair their ties with Iran. "The British are already trying to bring the Europeans on board, and they may or may not be successful," says George Joffe, a Middle East expert at the Centre for International Studies at Cambridge University. "The Europeans may say enough is enough, it's your own fault. After all, Britain has offended the Iranians by leading the demand for sanctions."

Few expect an early resolution to the stand-off. Three years ago, when Iran seized eight British servicemen off the Iran-Iraq coast, the dispute was over in three days; the British acknowledged the personnel might have been in the wrong place and they were quickly released.

This time, British officials are adamant that the unit was inside Iraqi waters, under a UN mandate, when it was seized. The Iranians say the crew strayed into Iranian waters, and want London to admit as much.

Impossible, say the British, scoffing at the way that Tehran changed the coordinates of the spot where it says the March 23 incident occurred, having first pinpointed a location in Iraqi waters. Officials are also furious that Leading Seaman Faye Turney was put on TV and made a statement that the British say amounted to a forced confession of trespassing.

"The British aren't going to comply" with Iranian demands to admit a mistake, says Professor Joffe. "Now we'll see a ratcheting up and it will be a question of who will blink first. The British will probably go next to commercial sanctions. The problem then is that the Iranians will become more and more intransigent."

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